Nurturing joy, lightness and space – whilst adapting to life in China…now France!

Tag Archives: april fool’s day

My son’s fifth baby tooth fell out this week. He carefully placed it in a small box under his pillow overnight in anticipation of a monetary exchange by morning (1€ is the going rate in our household). As most of us Anglo-Saxons know, the ‘person’ responsible for this exchange is, of course, the Tooth Fairy. However, in France, the task is carried out by a ‘Petite Souris’ (Little mouse)

It made me think about some of the other differences in traditions here in France in the month of April.

First of all there is a saying ‘En avril ne te decouvre pas d’un fil’ (‘In April don’t take off one thread’ meaning that despite the sunny weather, one should keep the cardigan). This is generally wise advice in my experience.

Then Easter chocolate season begins weeks before the actual date (there’s no difference there with Australia!). Chocolate shops (of which there are numerous in every town and city) are full of high-quality shiny chocolate rabbits, chickens, ducks, bunnies, but especially fish and bells. Yes, fish and bells!

What’s with the fish?

April 1st involves some little pranks – especially sticking paper fish on the backs of unsuspecting people – and is known as ‘poisson d’avril’ (‘April fish’). I presume that the chocolate shops use this day as an excuse to make chocolate fish throughout the whole month of April. Very small fish, often called ‘friture’, are very popular and are made with 70% dark, milk, or orange flavored chocolate. The quality of the chocolate here is really very good compared with the Cadbury-style chocolate of my youth.

And the bells?

Easter Bunny (just like the tooth fairy) doesn’t exist in France. Bells with wings are responsible for leaving chocolate eggs in the garden to be found on Easter Sunday. The Catholic tradition dictates that Church bells do not ring between Good Friday and Easter Sunday, to commemorate the death of Christ and his resurrection. The oral tradition says that the bells fly to Rome during this time to be blessed by the Pope, and then return from this trip loaded with chocolate.

Finally, even though the French have plenty of public holidays to mark Christian religious events, Good Friday is not one of them. The children, however, are on school vacation again (The ‘vacances de printemps’ = spring holiday). I was curious to find out whether my kids were spending more days in the year away from school than in it. Here is what I found: The average Australian child spends 200 days a year at school, the average European 186 and the average French child….(drum roll) ….144 days. Ah voila!